Thursday, March 27, 2014

A lot of political and a little lung news

Tuesday morning, 3/25 I had
the "clean out" bronchoscopy. While my breathing is still labored
with exertion, it is much better than the weekend or before the bronch--and I
don't think breathing is subject to the placebo effect. My Surgeon, Dr. Jim
Maloney, and his Fellow, Dr. Susan Ferguson, spoke with Bonnie while I was
still out, and she says they seemed positive. We were in Thursday, 3/27 for a
chest x-ay, pulmonary function test, 6-minute walk and clinic appointments. I saw
Dr. Ferguson and she said the lung looked better than they expected. The stent
is working to keep the airway open, and they are hopeful it is building scar
tissue which will strengthen the area to prevent the dynamic collapse. But it
also appears to be the problem, as it collects mucus and blocks air coming in. She
proscribed an addition saline nebulizer to use twice a day. It takes about a
half hour each time, but seems to be helping thin the mucus. The bronch I just
had helped clear some of that, thus the improved breathing. So they have
scheduled another clean out bronchoscopy for next week on Thursday, 4/3, and
left the surgical bronchoscopy in place for 4/11. Meanwhile, I still have Rehab
3 times a week, of course. I still think I'm winning this thing, but the fight
goes on. ~Bob

Excerpt: Al Qaeda in the Arabian
Peninsula launched a deadly attack earlier today that killed 20
Yemeni soldiers in an eastern province that has become a major battleground
over the past several years.

Excerpt: In the minds of most Americans—and perhaps most
members of Congress, too—the war in Afghanistan is already long since lost.
Spasms of violence like Thursday’s attack on the SerenaHotel in Kabul, a popular haunt for Western
expatriates, only seem to underscore the country’s ongoing fragility after more
than 12 years of frustrating, grinding conflict. And periodic anti-American
eruptions from Hamid Karzai, Afghanistan’s often difficult president, have
made it harder still to persuade the U.S. public that things here are
better than they seem from afar. (A much more positive view of the country than
we've seen before. I hope that the writer really knows what he's talking about,
and maybe in the end, lots of people living there are getting more security. And
just maybe the Taliban will wind down and become only an occasional attack that
really doesn't change anything in the country. I'm not sure at all that this is
really the case and that our departure will not bring on a very messy
situation. To have spent so much of our blood there, not to mention the
billions of dollars, and not have achieved anything would be a horrible
disappointment. And what would happen to women in general and anyone who worked
with us or for us is not something I want to think about. So let's all pray the
writer is on point and that we can hope for a good situation to come about in Afghanistan. --Del. my view: "When
the Taliban Comes Back." http://tartanmarine.blogspot.com/2009/11/when-taliban-comes-back.html
~Bob)

Excerpt: New
Jersey’s high taxes may be costing the state billions
of dollars a year in lost revenue as high-earning residents flee, according to
a recent study. […] The study shows the state has been steadily losing
high-net-worth residents since 2004, when Democratic Gov. Jim McGreevey signed
the millionaire’s tax into law.

Excerpt: Using adjusted gross income (AGI) as a proxy for
wealth, Brown found that a number of states, primarily those with relatively
high state income tax burden saw very large movements of money outside their
borders, with much of it moving to low-tax jurisdictions. For instance, Brown’s
data shows that between 1992 and 2010, there was a net outflow of income
totaling $68.1 billion from New
YorkState,
where the top income tax rate is 8.82 percent. About $19 billion of that money
went to Florida
alone, one of the few states with no income tax.

Excerpt: Facing increasing pressure from Egypt and deteriorating economic conditions in Gaza, Hamas has been flirting with the notion of re-entering the Iranian camp.
Now, Al-Monitor is reporting that Iranian monetary aid has
officially resumed to Hamas, but at a lower level than that it provided before
ties between the two broke.

"Never in my lifetime have I seen a law that is helping
so many people be so vilified," complained Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA).
"This is a huge success, this law." How successful? Well, a report
released in time for ObamaCare's four-year
anniversary Sunday indicates just the opposite. The American Action
Forum sums it up: "From a regulatory perspective, the law has imposed more
than $27.2 billion in total private sector costs, $8 billion in unfunded state
burdens, and more than 159 million paperwork hours on local governments and
affected entities. What's more troubling, the law has generated just $2.6
billion in annualized benefits, compared to $6.8 billion in annualized costs.
In other words, the ACA has imposed 2.5 times more costs than it has produced
in benefits." We'd say the law is doing a fine job of vilifying itself.

The London Telegraph has a new report on grizzly details of
what's happening in Britain's
health system: "The bodies of thousands of aborted and miscarried babies
were incinerated as clinical waste, with some even used to heat hospitals, an
investigation has found." According to the findings, 27 National Health
Service trusts incinerated more than 15,000 babies just over the last two
years, often as part of the "waste to energy" program these
"hospitals" are using. Health minister Dr. Dan Poulter called the
practice "totally unacceptable," but such detached-from-reality
practices are far more common in Britain than anyone cares to admit.
And we shouldn't expect any different in societies that implement socialized
medicine while devaluing the lives of the unborn through abortion on demand.

Excerpt: The Roosevelt administration once talked loudly of
pivoting to Asia to thwart a rising Japan. As a token of its
seriousness, in May 1940 it moved the home port of the Seventh Fleet from San Diego to Pearl Harbor
— but without beefing up the fleet’s strength. The then-commander of the
Pacific Fleet, Admiral James O. Richardson, an expert on the Japanese Imperial
Navy, protested vehemently over such a reckless redeployment. He felt that the
move might invite, but could not guard against, surprise attack.

Excerpt: And who is funding the $3 million Reid ad campaign
denouncing out-of-state billionaires for spending millions to influence
politics? Is it grass roots Louisiana
voters or local kindergarteners pitching in their pennies to stop the rampage
of the billionaires? The single biggest donor to Senate Majority PAC is an
out-of-state billionaire. Michael
Bloomberg donated $2.5 million this year.

Excerpt: Oleksandr Muzychko, an ultra-nationalist member of Ukraine’s recent protests who was wanted in Russia for alleged war crimes, was shot dead
late Monday in the western Ukrainian city of Rivne, according to reports by Russian news
outlets, RT and Interfax.

Excerpt: The issue on which Democrats are most vulnerable,
and have the least room to maneuver, is school choice. Democrats are heavily in
hock to the teachers' unions, who see public schools as places to guarantee
jobs for teachers, regardless of what that means for the education of students.
There are some charter schools and private schools that have low-income
minority youngsters equaling or exceeding national norms, despite the many
ghetto public schools where most students are nowhere close to meeting those
norms. Because teachers' unions oppose charter schools, most Democrats oppose
them, including black Democrats up to and including President Barack Obama.

Excerpt: if she was going to delay the open enrollment
period for Obamacare beyond the already-extended deadline of March 31. She
answered very plainly, “No sir.” Rep. Brady didn’t ask Sec. Sebelius
because he didn’t know the answer. The HHS has already delayed various deadlines multiple times. The question was
asked to see if Sec. Sebelius would finally tell the truth. She did not. No one
was surprised.

Excerpt: Whenever the idea of Christian persecution in America comes
up in a conversation with a liberal, their first reaction is often a sarcastic
snort and a condescending eye roll. “Persecution? Of a group of people who are
in the majority and vocally active in everyday life? That’s dumb.” This is a
red herring. It’s true that persecution in America is unlike persecution in
other parts of the globe, but that does not make the persecution that we deal
with any less real. We don’t deal with the threats of imminent death or worries
of our churches being attacked by jackbooted thugs… but we do deal with
government directed discrimination and media driven stereotyping of who we are.
And if you don’t believe that persecution against Christians exists in America?

Excerpt: Maybe, from moment to moment, this guy just …
doesn’t realize what’s coming out of his mouth. Hard
to believe he could forget saying on the Senate floor that all ObamaCare horror
stories — all of them —
are a GOP/Koch brothers fairy tale designed to besmirch the stellar reputation
of the Affordable Care Act. Those remarks got heavycoverage in conservative media,
and even got picked up at WaPo.

Excerpt: The Federal Election Commission has sent a letter
to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s campaign, asking for more information on
why he listed an expenditure of more than $11,000$16,000 in “holiday
gifts.”The gifts, I have learned, were purchased from his granddaughter, Ryan
Elisabeth Reid, who is a jewelry vendor in Berkeley, CA.
The gifts were later passed on to donors and supporters, a Reid spokeswoman
told me.

Excerpt: The 137-page, FBI-sworn affidavit against
California State Sen. Leland Yee, a Democrat who is also running for Secretary
of State, and over two dozen other individuals reads like a crime thriller.

Excerpt: The Benghazi,
Associated Press, and National Security Agency scandals are scary, but not as
disturbing as growing doubts about the honesty of permanent government itself.

It is no longer crackpot to doubt the once impeccable and
nonpartisan IRS. When it assured the public that it was not making decisions
about tax-exempt status based on politics, it lied. One of its top
commissioners, Lois Lerner, resigned and invoked the Fifth Amendment.

Excerpt: As state Sen. Wendy Davis prepared to launch her
campaign for governor last fall, her law firm was busy providing legal advice
on a $109 million bond issue for Dallas-FortWorthInternationalAirport. It marked one of
about 20 bond deals for which Newby Davis PLLC has served as co-bond counsel on
for the airport since Davis, a Democrat, and partner Brian Newby — Republican
Gov. Rick Perry's former chief of staff — started their firm in Fort Worth in 2010.

More than half of top
posts in key ObamaCare agency are vacant or held by 'acting' caretakers

Excerpt: Eighteen of the 32 top management jobs in the
federal agency that is "ground zero" for running Obamacare are
either vacant or filled on an acting basis. The agency is the Center for
Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight. Its problems start at the top.
(The very top. ~Bob)

Excerpt: Let’s start with a simple question. What happens
when a soldier runs out of ammunition during a firefight? First, he either
retreats, or he quickly becomes killed, wounded or captured. Second, his
tactical position converts from active to indefensible which imperils the
strategic array of the entire battlefield. What do you call a submarine that
runs out of torpedoes? Missing in action. That’s an old Navy joke
that dates back to WWII. However the fundamental military concept remains true:
without the ability to attack your enemy and inflict serious damage, you’re
unable to influence any subsequent events on the battlefield.

The
Somber News of Mike Lowe at the Red Purple Heart Rock. By Andy Weddington

Excerpt: The Obama administration came into power arrogantly
proclaiming the dawn of “smart power,” by which they meant the mere force of
Barack Obama's personality would settle all international disputes and restore
peace and calm to the world. The real result of this naïve bravado, however,
has been that America
is less feared and less respected. Russia
has begun rebuilding the Soviet empire, Iran
and North Korea pursue
nuclear weapons with impudence, Syria
flaunts international bans on chemical weapons, and our allies no longer
believe the U.S.
is trustworthy.

Excerpt: It’s a 2,700 page bill. There are 20,000 pages of
regulations. Major provisions seem to change every other week. And despite
Nancy Pelosi’s promise, four years after it passed most of us still aren’t sure
about everything that’s in it. How can something like that possibly be fixed? It’s
easier than you might suppose. Previously, I recommended four simple ideas: Replace
all the ObamaCare mandates and subsidies with a universal tax credit that is
the same for everyone. Replace all the medical savings accounts with a Roth
Health Savings Account (after-tax deposits and tax free withdrawals). Allow
Medicaid to compete with private insurance, with everyone having the right to
buy in or get out. Denationalize and deregulate the exchanges and require them
to institute change of health status insurance.

Excerpt: But Democrats are given a wide, wide berth for
comments they themselves would be quick to label racist. South
Carolina Democratic chairman Dick Harpootlian, for example, urged his party
to “send Nikki Haley back to wherever the hell she came from.” (That would be Bamberg, S.C., but her
parents were Sikh immigrants from India.) Last year, Secretary of
Defense Chuck Hagel asked an Indian man at a university Q&A if he
was a member of the Taliban.

Excerpt: The Saudi Monarchy and Putin aren’t afraid of
Barack Obama or even of an F-35; they’re afraid of fracking. Saudi Arabia’s Prince
Alwaleed Bin Talalsaid that “North American shale gas production is an
inevitable threat.” And
Putin suddenly turned into an environmentalist when it came to fracking
warning that it makes “black stuff comes out of the tap.” The Russians and the
Saudis are both threatened by American energy production for economic reasons
and political reasons.

Excerpt: The rich may be getting richer, but the poor are
definitely not getting poorer. In fact, most Americans got richer over the last
35 years. President Obama likes to stress that income inequality has increased
in the United States,
but it is hardly "the defining challenge of our time," as he has
called it, says Ronald Bailey, a science correspondent for Reason Magazine.
Brookings Institution economist Gary Burtless used data from a December 2013
Congressional Budget Office (CBO) study to show that from 1979 to 2010 (this
was the last year with available data) the bottom quintile's after-tax income
in constant dollars rose by 49 percent. For the second lowest, middle and
fourth quintile, those incomes increased by a respective 37 percent, 36 percent
and 45 percent. ... In fact, a study by the U.S. Treasury looked at income
mobility from 1987 to 1996 and from 1996 to 2005. Over half of taxpayers moved
to a different income quintile during that time. And half of taxpayers who
started in the bottom quintile moved to a higher income group by the end of
each time period.

Excerpt: Burke did not mince words in responding to a
question about the Catholic reaction to President Obama’s attack on religious
freedom, especially through policies such as the controversial HHS
mandate. “He appears to be a totally secularized man who aggressively
promotes anti-life and anti-family policies,” said Burke. “Now he wants to
restrict the exercise of the freedom of religion to freedom of worship, that
is, he holds that one is free to act according to his conscience within the
confines of his place of worship but that, once the person leaves the place of
worship, the government can constrain him to act against his rightly-formed
conscience, even in the most serious of moral questions.”

Excerpt: Almost every week now, we learn from this
administration of another racist conspiracy in America. The latest involves
preschool teachers who secretly scheme to single out black tots for punishment.
The administration put out a new report Friday showing black
youngsters make up 18% of kids enrolled in preschool but almost half the
preschoolers suspended more than once. It suggested this was part of a racist
conspiracy to start criminalizing black youths as toddlers. (OK, here we go
again, the statistics say that Black kids have more problems than other races,
so that MUST mean there is racism amongst those working with the kids. Problems
that relate to social conditions are only to be expected, and simple
correlation does mean anything when applied inappropriately, as the race
fanatics keep doing. Problems will not be solved, but only made worse, by false
conclusions drawn by racial politics. --Del. They also claim that it is racist
to point out FBI statistics that blacks are 13% of the population, but commit
53% of the murders. Facts are racist. But in my view, it is racist to cover
this up and not address the problem, because the vast majority of the victims
are also black. Their deaths don't matter to those who cover for black thugs
out of "racial sensitivity." Yes, I know that "thug" is yet
another recently-discovered racist code word. Well, I call the Aryan
Brotherhood in the prisons thugs too--and their diversity recruitment program
is notoriously weak. ~Bob)

Ecerpt: New York Times reporter James Risen called the Obama
administration “the greatest enemy of press freedom that we have encountered in
at least a generation” on Friday, explaining that the White House seeks to
control the flow of information and those that refuse to play along “will be
punished.” Poynter reports that Risen made the remarks while speaking at
Sources and Secrets conference — a meeting of journalism and communication
professionals held in New York
City. The foreign policy reporter, who is
currently fighting a fierce court battle with the federal
government over his protection of a confidential source, warned that press
freedom is under serious attack in today’s America. (While FLOTUS lectures the
Communist Chinese on Freedom of Speech. Pot calling kettle black. Oops. After
it came out POTUS sees questions prior to “news conference” and frequently
questions are determined by White House and certain reporters earmarked to ask
them, i.e., entire thing staged to look real, when, in fact, PRAVDA lives in
Amerika. --Barb)